Textiles are used in our everyday life. When textiles and electronics are integrated, new application fields emerge. In many fields, such as the clothing industry, textiles are cut out from large sheets to form desired shapes and features. Conversely, electronic components are typically placed onto a predefined circuit board that is already sized for the functionality. If electronics are placed onto textiles, manufacturing costs will decrease and user versatility will increase if the electronic textile sheets can be cut to any shape without losing functionality.
US 2006/0035554 discloses a textile fabric that can be produced with a large size and be cut to a desired shape. The fabric has a plurality of microelectronic components for electronic data processing arranged throughout the textile fabric. These microelectronic components exchange electronic messages with each other to enable self-organization to thereby adapt the electronic textile to a particular size obtained.
A drawback of the electronic textile disclosed in US 2006/0035554 is that a large number of microelectronic devices capable of processing and data-communication are needed, which leads to increased costs for the electronic textile.